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All the ideas for 'The Coherence Theory of Truth', 'Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority' and 'Morals and Modals'

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18 ideas

2. Reason / D. Definition / 13. Against Definition
9331 How do we determine which of the sentences containing a term comprise its definition? [Horwich]
     Full Idea: How are we to determine which of the sentences containing a term comprise its definition?
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §2)
     A reaction: Nice question. If I say 'philosophy is the love of wisdom' and 'philosophy bores me', why should one be part of its definition and the other not? What if I stipulated that the second one is part of my definition, and the first one isn't?
3. Truth / B. Truthmakers / 12. Rejecting Truthmakers
19079 For idealists reality is like a collection of beliefs, so truths and truthmakers are not distinct [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: Idealists do not believe that there is an ontological distinction between beliefs and what makes beliefs true. From their perspective, reality is something like a collection of beliefs.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §2.1)
     A reaction: This doesn't seem to me to wholly reject truthmakers, since beliefs can still be truthmakers for one another. This is something like Davidson's view, that only beliefs can justify other beliefs.
3. Truth / D. Coherence Truth / 1. Coherence Truth
19076 Coherence theories differ over the coherence relation, and over the set of proposition with which to cohere [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: Coherence theories of truth differ on their accounts of the coherence relation, and on their accounts of the set (or sets) of propositions with which true propositions occur (the 'specified set').
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §1)
     A reaction: Coherence is clearly more than consistency or mutual entailment, and I like to invoke explanation. The set has to be large, or the theory is absurd (as two absurdities can 'cohere'). So very large, or very very large, or maximally large?
19077 Two propositions could be consistent with your set, but inconsistent with one another [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: It is unsatisfactory for the coherence relation to be consistency, because two propositions could be consistent with a 'specified set', and yet be inconsistent with each other. That would imply they are both true, which is impossible.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §1)
     A reaction: I'm not convinced by this. You first accept P because it is consistent with the set; then Q turns up, which is consistent with everything in the set except P. So you have to choose between them, and might eject P. Your set was too small.
19078 Coherence with actual beliefs, or our best beliefs, or ultimate ideal beliefs? [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: One extreme for the specified set is the largest consistent set of propositions currently believed by actual people. A moderate position makes it the limit of people's enquiries. The other extreme is what would be believed by an omniscient being.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §1)
     A reaction: One not considered is the set of propositions believed by each individual person. Thoroughgoing relativists might well embrace that one. Peirce and Putnam liked the moderate one. I'm taken with the last one, since truth is an ideal, not a phenomenon.
19084 Coherent truth is not with an arbitrary set of beliefs, but with a set which people actually do believe [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: It must be remembered that coherentists do not believe that the truth of a proposition consists in coherence with an arbitrarily chosen set of propositions; the coherence is with a set of beliefs, or a set of propositions held to be true.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §3.1)
     A reaction: This is a very good response to critics who cite bizarre sets of beliefs which happen to have internal coherence. You have to ask why they are not actually believed, and the answer must be that the coherence is not extensive enough.
3. Truth / D. Coherence Truth / 2. Coherence Truth Critique
19083 How do you identify the best coherence set; and aren't there truths which don't cohere? [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: The two main objections to the coherence theory of truth are that there is no way to identify the 'specified set' of propositions without contradiction, ...and that some propositions are true which cohere with no set of beliefs.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §3.1/2)
     A reaction: The point of the first is that you need a prior knowledge of truth to say which of two sets is the better one. The second one is thinking of long-lost tiny details from the past, which seem to be true without evidence. A huge set might beat the first one.
3. Truth / H. Deflationary Truth / 2. Deflationary Truth
19075 Deflationary theories reject analysis of truth in terms of truth-conditions [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: Unlike deflationary theories, the coherence and correspondence theories both hold that truth is a property of propositions that can be analyzed in terms of the sorts of truth-conditions propositions have, and the relation propositions stand in to them.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], Intro)
     A reaction: This is presumably because deflationary theories reject the external relations of a proposition as a feature of its truth. This evidently leaves them in need of a theory of meaning, which may be fairly minimal. Horwich would be an example.
10. Modality / C. Sources of Modality / 1. Sources of Necessity
14629 If we are told the source of necessity, this seems to be a regress if the source is not already necessary [Blackburn]
     Full Idea: If we ask why A must be the case, and A is then proved from B, that explains it if B must be so. If the eventual source cites some truth F, then if F just is so, there is strong pressure to feel that the original necessity has not been explained.
     From: Simon Blackburn (Morals and Modals [1987], 1)
     A reaction: [compressed] Ross Cameron wrote a reply to this which I like. I'm fishing for the idea that essence is the source of necessity (as Kit Fine says), but that essence itself is not necessary (as only I say, apparently!).
14529 If something underlies a necessity, is that underlying thing necessary or contingent? [Blackburn, by Hale/Hoffmann,A]
     Full Idea: Blackburn asks of what theorists propose as underlying the necessity of a proposition, the question whether they themselves are conceived as obtaining of necessity or merely contingently.
     From: report of Simon Blackburn (Morals and Modals [1987], p.120-1) by Bob Hale/ Aviv Hoffmann - Introduction to 'Modality' 1
     A reaction: I've seen a reply to this somewhere: I think the thought was that a necessity wouldn't be any less necessary if it had a contingent source, any more than the father of a world champion boxer has to be a world champion boxer.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 1. Nature of the A Priori
9333 A priori belief is not necessarily a priori justification, or a priori knowledge [Horwich]
     Full Idea: It is one thing to believe something a priori and another for this belief to be epistemically justified. The latter is required for a priori knowledge.
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §8)
     A reaction: Personally I would agree with this, because I don't think anything should count as knowledge if it doesn't have supporting reasons, but fans of a priori knowledge presumably think that certain basic facts are just known. They are a priori justified.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 6. A Priori from Reason
9342 Understanding needs a priori commitment [Horwich]
     Full Idea: Understanding is itself based on a priori commitment.
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §12)
     A reaction: This sounds plausible, but needs more justification than Horwich offers. This is the sort of New Rationalist idea I associate with Bonjour. The crucial feature of the New lot is, I take it, their fallibilism. All understanding is provisional.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 8. A Priori as Analytic
9332 Meaning is generated by a priori commitment to truth, not the other way around [Horwich]
     Full Idea: Our a priori commitment to certain sentences is not really explained by our knowledge of a word's meaning. It is the other way around. We accept a priori that the sentences are true, and thereby provide it with meaning.
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §8)
     A reaction: This sounds like a lovely trump card, but how on earth do you decide that a sentence is true if you don't know what it means? Personally I would take it that we are committed to the truth of a proposition, before we have a sentence for it.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 9. A Priori from Concepts
9341 Meanings and concepts cannot give a priori knowledge, because they may be unacceptable [Horwich]
     Full Idea: A priori knowledge of logic and mathematics cannot derive from meanings or concepts, because someone may possess such concepts, and yet disagree with us about them.
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §12)
     A reaction: A good argument. The thing to focus on is not whether such ideas are a priori, but whether they are knowledge. I think we should employ the word 'intuition' for a priori candidates for knowledge, and demand further justification for actual knowledge.
9334 If we stipulate the meaning of 'number' to make Hume's Principle true, we first need Hume's Principle [Horwich]
     Full Idea: If we stipulate the meaning of 'the number of x's' so that it makes Hume's Principle true, we must accept Hume's Principle. But a precondition for this stipulation is that Hume's Principle be accepted a priori.
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §9)
     A reaction: Yet another modern Quinean argument that all attempts at defining things are circular. I am beginning to think that the only a priori knowledge we have is of when a group of ideas is coherent. Calling it 'intuition' might be more accurate.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 10. A Priori as Subjective
9339 A priori knowledge (e.g. classical logic) may derive from the innate structure of our minds [Horwich]
     Full Idea: One potential source of a priori knowledge is the innate structure of our minds. We might, for example, have an a priori commitment to classical logic.
     From: Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §11)
     A reaction: Horwich points out that to be knowledge it must also say that we ought to believe it. I'm wondering whether if we divided the whole territory of the a priori up into intuitions and then coherent justifications, the whole problem would go away.
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 4. Meaning as Truth-Conditions
19074 Are truth-condtions other propositions (coherence) or features of the world (correspondence)? [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: For the coherence theory of truth, the truth conditions of propositions consist in other propositions. The correspondence theory, in contrast, states that the truth conditions of propositions are ... objective features of the world.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], Intro)
     A reaction: It is obviously rather important for your truth-conditions theory of meaning that you are clear about your theory of truth. A correspondence theory is evidently taken for granted, even in possible worlds versions.
19082 Coherence truth suggests truth-condtions are assertion-conditions, which need knowledge of justification [Young,JO]
     Full Idea: Coherence theorists can argue that the truth conditions of a proposition are those under which speakers tend to assert it, ...and that speakers can only make a practice of asserting a proposition under conditions they can recognise as justifying it.
     From: James O. Young (The Coherence Theory of Truth [2013], §2.2)
     A reaction: [compressed] This sounds rather verificationist, and hence wrong, since if you then asserted anything for which you didn't know the justification, that would remove its truth, and thus make it meaningless.